Opposition wants wheels on school bus services to keep going round and round

Peter Rundle, The Nationals WA MP for Roe, calls for evergreen contracts for existing regional school bus services in WA.

Transcript

00:00Well I've got to say I was pleased with the result that some of those bus

00:04services look to be reinstated or at least given trial periods. The shame of

00:09it is that I've actually had to do agreements as I did last year to

00:13actually get a result and this is the scenario where when there's media

00:18attention, when there's agreements in Parliament, then sometimes school bus

00:23services might actually listen up and make some changes. It shouldn't have to

00:28be like that. They should be talking to families, talking to communities and

00:31looking at what's actually happening out on the ground.

00:34Do you fear that other examples that will be coming up in the future where this will be the same issue?

00:37Absolutely. I think there will be and I'll stay on the case and from my

00:42perspective it's not good enough. We need to help our regional families out. We

00:48need to look at the evergreen contract situation as well because this is an

00:52important element as well. Our school bus contractors need to have businesses,

00:57they need to have continuity and they need to know that the rug's not going to be

01:01pulled out from under them. You've been in consultation with the ICPA. What have

01:04they been able to tell you? Well what they've recently discovered is there's

01:08probably another 15 cases out there around the state. They're putting those

01:11together and I'm sure they'll be approaching school bus services as well.

01:15So well done to the ICPA for their advocacy for our regional families. Once

01:21again it shouldn't be taking groups like ICPA to actually try and deal with our

01:26school bus issues but certainly from my perspective we'll keep sticking with it.

01:32I'll keep advocating as well because I know how important this is to regional families.

01:37What we've seen is the Cook Labor Government try and save a few bucks on

01:41school bus contracts in the regions while blowing billions of dollars on

01:45Metronet. The Liberal Party and the National Party completely understand the

01:49importance of these contracts and the importance of school bus networks in

01:52regional Western Australia. I went to school on an orange bus. My children went

01:56to school on an orange bus. We get it. We understand how important this network is.

02:00It's small businesses in local towns right across regional Western Australia.